“After our mission is complete you may change your hair back to whatever you wish, but while we are working together, this is our color.”
Ambrose looked around the group and was pleased that they all appeared eager, already feeling part of a special team.
“Finally, I have one more thing to say and then I really can shut up. There will be situations in the demon world where we need to communicate when we can’t touch one another. The best way to do that is by hand signals. And, to help us, I’ve asked an expert to teach us all. She has also been into the demon world and come through it, so she knows exactly what we’ll have to face.”
And, with that, Tanya stepped forward.
EDYON
CALIA, CALIDOR
EDYON SLID slowly off the cool marble and sank down into his warm bath. He put his head back, feeling his hair float out in the water. On the ceiling was a painting of a garden full of flowers and fruit trees with distant, snowcapped mountains. It was beautiful. Everything around Edyon looked beautiful, sounded beautiful (there was the tinkling of chimes in the window), felt beautiful (warm, warm, warm), and even smelled beautiful (the almond oil in the bath had an aroma delicious enough to eat). Everything was designed with his comfort and security in mind. Or at least it was designed for someone’s security. This room was the same as the one next door. They had been the rooms for Thelonius’s two legitimate sons, Castor and Argentus, who had died earlier in the year. Were they still alive to inherit the throne, Edyon would never have come to know his father.
Had Castor lain back in the bath like Edyon was doing now?
Undoubtedly.
Had he, too, submerged and floated and breathed in the almond oil?
Possibly.
Castor had expected to be the next ruler of Calidor. Now he was gone, and who was bathing here?
A bastard son from another land.
Edyon felt sorry for them, his dead half brothers, and a little sorry for himself. He was now in their shoes—well, in their bath anyway—and though he was surrounded by riches, he was also surrounded by intrigue, doubt, gossip, and lies.
The lords were a constant problem. Thelonius relied on them: they provided income from taxes and men to fight in the army. Thelonius had sent a delegation of just two men to Pitoria, because none of the other lords would go. Thelonius had reassured Edyon, “Lord Darby is old and frail, but he’s experienced in war. I trust his judgment. He’ll advise us well.”
From his bath, Edyon could see out of the wide windows to the blue sky filled with fluffy white clouds. Even the sky was pretty.
Talin, his short, chubby personal servant, appeared hold-ing some towels. “It’s time, Your Highness.”
“Already?” Edyon felt a squirm of nerves in his stomach.
He stood, and while Talin patted his body dry with a large towel, Edyon dried the gold necklace that he wore round his neck. He never took it off, not even in his bath. The chain no longer held the gold ring that was the prince’s seal—the ring was lost somewhere in a river in Pitoria. But the necklace was all he had from his old life. The necklace re-minded him of his past and linked him to his future. It also reminded him of March, who had rescued the chain from the river. March, who should be drying him now. March, who should be dressing him. March should be massaging his shoulders and calming him with his witty conversation. March, his one friend.
But March had betrayed him. March had lied to him from the start.
And, anyway, who was Edyon kidding? “March was aw-ful at conversation.”
“I’m sorry, what was that, Your Highness?”
“Nothing, Talin. Nothing.”
But somehow March could always calm Edyon, had always helped him, had always . . . believed in him.
March wanted to kidnap you and sell you to the Brigantines. Stop thinking of that wretched boy!
“There’s a lot of oil in your hair still, sir,” Talin said. “I can rub it and wave it with my fingers. Your hair is at its most attractive when it’s waved.” And he set to work on Edyon’s hair, while Edyon allowed himself to be primped and clothed and positioned.
At the end of it, Edyon looked in the mirror and was surprised by what he saw. A handsome-ish young man with a soft face and a